


the living and the damned

by M_Leigh



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Folklore, M/M, pretty vague and not very concrete thoughts about suicide, some very unpleasant images and some very unpleasant language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-04
Updated: 2014-08-04
Packaged: 2018-02-11 17:03:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2076030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/M_Leigh/pseuds/M_Leigh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Do you know the story of the woman in the lake? they asked him, sharpening his knives and their own, and called her by her name in the language that they spoke that he spoke also because he had forgotten he did not speak it. </i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	the living and the damned

Do you know the story of the woman in the lake? they asked him, and he said nothing, because they had cut out his tongue a long time before that, even though it was still lying thick and wet in his mouth. He had forgotten about it. Do you know the story of the woman in the lake? they asked him, sharpening his knives and their own, and called her by her name in the language that they spoke that he spoke also because he had forgotten he did not speak it. There are women in the lake, they told him. Women without souls. They fall in love with men sometimes. Can’t resist real blood, they say. Laughter. One time, they say, one of them was stupid enough to fall in love with one of them. You know what happened when he found out about her? You know? He did not know because he did not know the story and he could not say because they had cut out his tongue. Look at him he’s dumb as a dog. Well he sent her away, couldn’t bear the sight of her. All disgusting, really, from the bottom of the lake, once you could really see what she was. Oh, I forgot—she’d lost her voice, too, to get out of the water and be with him. You know something about that, huh? Huh? So they tell her she’s got to kill him to get her voice back and she doesn’t do it, stupid cunt. Women, no taste for blood. She gets loads of other people killed, mind—lures them into the lake, fucking eats them—but murder like that, no can do. Winds up kissing the man in the end. Kills him, of course. She’s a demon. You can’t go around kissing demons and expect to survive. But men are fucking stupid when it comes to women, aren’t we, lads? Aren’t we? You were a ladies man, I bet. I bet you were. No more of that. No more of that. Can you imagine anybody kissing that face? Him looking like that at a lady? Christ. Those fingers up some bitch’s cunt. Can you imagine.

 

*

 

Can he speak? he asked, and they said no, and they said yes, and they said: he can do whatever you want him to do except think. But that was not true either. He just could not remember that he could think. But that was not the same thing.

 

*

 

I’m going to tell you a story, he said. You don’t know any stories.

Do you, he said.

He didn’t know any stories. He hadn’t ever heard a story before. The woman went back into the lake, and she ate men until their bones crunched between her teeth, but did she remember that she was a woman? Did she remember the body of her lover on the shore? Do demons remember anything except hell burning inside of them?

He didn’t know anything about that. He didn’t know any stories.

I’m going to tell you a story about the world, he said. About what the world has become. About your place in it.

He stopped listening. He can do whatever you want except think, they had said, but he did not remember that either.

 

*

 

Do you know the story of the woman in the lake? She was a demon. She kissed him and he died but she never did. She just kept living and living and living.

 

*

 

Maybe, he thought, much later, after many things had occurred, he would walk straight into the middle of a lake and stay at the bottom and drown. Arm sunk to the muck. Or maybe he would never die at all. Maybe he was too broken. Only humans died. He was a machine – or something else.

Do you know the story of the woman in the lake? She came out to follow her lover and then went back into the water, choking, filling up her lungs, until everything when slow, and dark—

She came out to follow her lover—

She stayed in the water and crunched the bones in her teeth and when she breathed in her lungs were already full of water. No difference. No difference.

Maybe, he thought vaguely, without real intent, he’d set himself on fire.

 

*

 

Do you know the story of the woman in the lake? she asked, and he said no, because he knew no stories, except that he did. The story was written all over his bones. That’s funny, she said, I knew somebody who used to tell it to me once, a long time ago. They say those stories don’t die out. They just live forever, on and on and on, until nobody speaks the language anymore. And even then sometimes. Anyway, I knew somebody who used to tell me this story about a woman in a lake. I thought maybe you would have heard it. No, he said. Well, she said. In the story there’s a woman, and she falls in love with a man. But they don’t have anything in common – she lives in the lake and is a strange creature, and he’s just a regular person. Or maybe he isn’t so regular, I don’t remember anymore. Maybe he’s very irregular. So somehow she strikes a deal with someone – someone very bad – to let her go up on land to be with him. To try to convince him to love her. But they take away her voice. That’s the price, for being allowed to leave. But he falls in love with her anyway, because there’s something about her – something about her he recognizes, somehow, like he remembers her from a dream he’s forgotten. Of course he finds out what she is – he’s put off for a little while but not very long, because he isn’t actually regular after all, but by that point she’s back underwater. And her family won’t let her go. So he just walks up and down along the shore of the lake, for years and years, and all he can hear are the echoes of her voice in the distance, which she never got back, and he doesn’t know that it’s her voice, because he never got to talk to her, but it haunts him anyway, until he’s old, and grey, all the way into the grave.

That’s not how it ends, he said.

I thought you said you didn’t know it, she replied, and he stopped.

But that’s not how it ends, he repeated.

Yes it is, she said.

 

*

 

There is a woman in the lake whose tongue has been cut out and when she opens her mouth he sees the blood pouring out and recoils, disgusted, and she has to hold her hands up in front of her face, fingers red, and only her eyes can speak. Nothing else. Her tongue is in somebody else’s hand but she doesn’t know where he’s gone. She can still feel it: feel the fingers around it: but it is gone.

 

*

 

Bucky, he said. Bucky, I don’t—

He thought about reaching up and cutting out his tongue and putting it in his hand and holding it out in front of him. Forcing it into his hand. But he didn’t need to do that because his tongue was cut out already. It didn’t matter that it was inside his mouth. His voice was somewhere else, speaking a language he had forgotten he didn’t know. His mouth was just teeth. Gums.

I don’t know what to do if you won’t – say anything. I – Bucky. Natasha said you – she says you talk, sometimes. Not – much – she doesn’t say what. But I don’t – I don’t – if you could just say something. Anything. I – _Bucky_ –

In the version of the story that he did not know that he knew, the woman in the lake never wanted to kill her lover but she did anyway. It was dragged out of her: a kiss did it. But what would have happened if she had done everything she could to kill him – and still somehow failed—

And then—

And then—

Bucky, he said.

 

*

 

There is an old story of a woman in a lake who fell in love with a regular man, except maybe he was not very regular after all. But when she looked at him from just under the water the sun lit up his hair like it was made of gold, and his body was firm and solid and of the earth, and she wanted to be where he was and to put her hands on him, but she did not know how. In the story he does not survive, or maybe he does, and she has her tongue cut out, or maybe she does not, but one thing remains the same: she goes back to the bottom of the water, goes silent back to the deep, and maybe she eats the bodies of corpses and maybe she does not. But she is never free. And she never has anything to keep inside of her but the memory of her love, which in time will become nothing more than a shadow of a shadow of nothing – or maybe not nothing. As close to nothing as it is possible to be without quite getting there. And even if he does survive he dies eventually, because that is what people are built for.

Bucky, he said, but of course he was already dead, and then not dead anymore, and that was both of them, funnily enough.

 

*

 

Bucky, he said, face creasing, reaching forward to pull at his hands where they were digging into his face, Bucky, Bucky, stop it, what are you doing – but he stopped when he heard the noise, the weird low noise in the back of his throat.

Bucky, he said, quiet, and then his hands changed, too: one of them fell and one of them curled around the side of his head, careful, like he was trying to hold the words in long enough for him to get them out.

He was holding his tongue in his hand and he needed to pick it up and sew it back on, only that wouldn’t be fast enough – weld it – do something, anything, anything at all so that he could speak again, say anything—

Bucky, he said, and tucked one stray lock of hair behind his ear, and he let out a violent, shuddering breath, and said, too fast, do you know the story about the woman in the lake, and dug his fingers into his legs.

He went still, and put both his hands in his lap. No, he said. I don’t think so.

How to tell it? The only story he knew. The only one. If someone asked him that question now he would say, Yes. Because he did. He knew this was true. He knew that story. It was his.

There was a woman in the lake, he started, looking down. He did not want to watch himself being watched. She was – she was a demon. She was – she didn’t have a soul. They – tricked men into coming into the lake and then they ate them. And she – she – fell in love with a – regular person. A, a good person. So they had to – to leave, she had to – they had to cut out her tongue. He drew his hand across his face, miming a slice. So she didn’t have a tongue. And – she couldn’t talk. But she didn’t open her mouth and he didn’t know and – he fell in love with her anyway. But he found out – somehow – and then he – sent her away so – she had to go back. And they – they told her – to kill him – because they wanted him dead – and she – she almost did but she didn’t – and – she managed to – tell him without talking – and – he kissed her even though she didn’t have a tongue but it killed him because she wasn’t for people like that and they came back to get her to take her back forever but she knew she couldn’t go so she killed herself. He thudded his fist against his gut and let it sit there. He hadn’t looked up the whole time. He stared down at his fist for a long moment before uncurling it and letting it fall.

I, he said. I. Bucky.

He curled his hands into fists. One of them made strange whirring noises when he did it.

Bucky, Steve said, and reached up and touched his hair again, gently, while he forced himself to stay still. I was the one who got frozen in the ice.

His hand was still on him and he was still trembling. I was the one in the river, he said. And you pulled me out.

He closed his eyes. Screwed them up. Heavy breathing.

Bucky, he said, and ran one hand carefully through his hair. What would have happened if neither of them died?

He shook his head. She always went back. She always went back to the river. Always went back to the water choking up into the lungs and the blackness closing in—

Bucky, he said gently, kindly, one thumb moving slowly along the curve of his cheek.

I, Bucky said, and realized he could not remember ever saying it. He swallowed, and opened his eyes, shaking violently. He knew the word he wanted to say but he did not know if he was going to be able to say it. He opened his mouth and tried. He tried – and he tried—

It’s all right, he said, still rubbing his thumb along his cheek. You’ve got time.

“Steve,” he choked out, and took in a shuddering breath as Steve started to cry.

 

*

 

There is a story that nobody tells about a woman in a lake who crawled out on her own hands and knees, who choked up swamp muck until there was nothing but bile in her mouth, who pulled herself up by the low-hanging branches of a tree and stood there, in the forest, naked as the day she was born. There is a story of a woman no longer in a lake, wiping the mud off her face, covering herself when a man came down the road and turned politely away, cheeks turning red. There is a story of a woman looking at the sun lighting up his gold hair and his body that was of the earth and the color on his cheeks and opening her mouth and saying, voice hoarse: I think I’ve gotten lost. Could you please help me. And the man saying: yes.

**Author's Note:**

> The core story here is taken from Dvořák's [_Rusalka_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rusalka_%28opera%29), which is of course taken from other stories, and so on. Mostly taken from my undergraduate Czech lit classes, so, thanks, Professor [redacted]. You were awesome.
> 
> I was also thinking about various stories of [kvikindi](http://archiveofourown.org/users/kvikindi/pseuds/kvikindi)'s while writing this, in particular [this one](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1459930). But you should read them all.
> 
> You can find me on tumblr [here](http://morgan-leigh.tumblr.com/).


End file.
